Semu Fatutoa was once a Samoan Chief and the tattoos shrouding his legs are immutable proof of the pain he endured to earn his title. But those tattoos cost him something else: His daughter, nine year old Aveolela, drowned in the ocean on the day Semu received the tattoos. Rather than assume his chiefly duties, he fled. Two years later, Semu is a cab driver in Honolulu. He drives in circles, keeps his legs covered, and slowly forgets his old life until tsunami is forecasted for the city of Honolulu, and anyone with any sense heads for higher ground. Probably the Chief would go, except for the eight-year-old Hawaiian girl wandering the city, whose intrusion into his sequestered life starts to seems like a message.